


Four Worlds They Didn’t Live In, and One In Which They Might

by LittleRaven



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-08
Updated: 2019-12-08
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:48:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21724036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleRaven/pseuds/LittleRaven
Relationships: Gabrielle Burnham/Mirror Philippa Georgiou, Michael Burnham & Philippa Georgiou, Michael Burnham & Sylvia Tilly
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5
Collections: Star Trek Holidays 2019





	Four Worlds They Didn’t Live In, and One In Which They Might

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kira_katrine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kira_katrine/gifts).



There was someone new on the ship. Sylvia felt the excitement build up in her. It was a good thing the humans of old had chosen to let their robotic descendants experience the simulation of an adrenaline rush; she couldn’t imagine living without that high, and she certainly wouldn’t like to, even if it meant she could overload her circuits a bit sometimes. It was, she reflected, ironic that the bodies built to continue humanity were in some ways less durable than flesh had been. The greatest challenge her parent race had faced turned out to be not leaving their worldly frontier, but hitting the limits of their self-understanding. 

Well, she’d figure it out, or at least make do until someone did. In the meantime, she had a shipmate to greet. 

She went right toward her, offering to shake her hand in the old Earth way robots across the galaxy still maintained. 

It did not work as well as she’d hoped. Sylvia reconsidered. She wasn’t sure if her overtures were wanted, or even a wise choice in light of the circumstances. Certainly Michael’s position on that was clear. 

They remained desirable, she decided. Her emotion circuits didn’t lie. They were floating in a realm of empty space; all they had were their ties to each other and to what had brought them together. So yes, actually, it was wiser to reach out rather than isolate a fellow member of the crew. Especially one who was already isolated. 

Michael didn’t need to want to boop circuits with her, but if she were so logical she’d have to see what Sylvia saw and give in to the argument presented. 

The world under the sea had its share of beauty. Michael had grown to love it as dearly as the world above, for all that it never wholly embraced her. Her body did not suit it. She couldn’t breathe, or withstand the pressures of the currents, without the ever-present pocket of air which surrounded her, a wondrous gift she could never be thankful enough for. Her mind was deemed equally unsuitable by its other denizens. Her family supported her as much as they could, and it was only their influence in this world which gave her a place in it. She strove to earn it with discipline and study, learning all the things a mermaid should know. 

Perhaps it should not have surprised her when her efforts failed. 

Now she had been taken back, to the world where air could blow freely past her skin. She hadn’t seen it in over a decade. She could no longer call it home. It rose around her, harsh in its openness. She blinked in the light. The air weighed on her like it never had in the water. Would she leave it too one day? Would she go beyond it to yet another world, one higher, in the sky? Would that place feel any better, any easier to be in? 

She wouldn’t be alone, she was told. She would be around her kind, and many others as well. Michael nodded. She would not contradict her captain, at least not until she had something to express beyond the emptiness she found when she looked for words. Certainly she couldn’t object to her pleasantries. She knew others found this sort of thing helpful, soothing. It’s lack of power to affect her current state was not the captain’s fault. She had intended to be gentle; it reminded Michael of her mother’s efforts. 

She could respect the attempt, at least. One little thing among many to accept, in this new life on the surface of the water she had been raised under. 

Her life, it seemed, would always be one of adaptation. 

There was a ship, traveling nowhere in particular, crewed by no one you ever wanted to meet. It flew the skies, in the dark between the stars; you could mistake it for one, if you did not look closely, if you glanced up at the bright speck for only a moment and didn’t see how much faster it moved than any other light. 

Some people did, and they knew, and this was why the stories spread. 

They said the ship was full, lively even, for all the dead within. They said you could meet a dream, or a nightmare, and you wouldn’t know which until the crew let you in, if you took the hand of its captain, answered his questions right and honest. 

She would’ve had some fun with that one, if the circumstances were different, Philippa decided. Pity she was an inconvenience at the moment. Maybe if they’d had a little more time...and if Michael weren’t anxious to spend what they did have of it with her. 

Oh, that would actually make it even better. Color her opinion of her lost, heroic mother, who would be more willing to have a quickie with someone Michael didn’t trust than to reconnect with her daughter. 

The thought was delightful. It would distress Michael, but not too much, and after all she’d gotten used to the woman being dead. She wasn’t pathetic enough to need her now, when she wasn’t even wanted by her.

This one might take some doing, if the mother was anything like her daughter. She looked as determined, and assuming what she’d claimed was true, it too spoke to them sharing that quality. 

Could be worth further investigation. She wasn’t the only one whose claims could deserve a second look. Besides, she didn’t like Leland so insistent. He had much to learn yet. 

She would keep that data away from him a little while longer, let him get impatient. 

There was a challenge for her to win in this Gabrielle Burnham. 

The first thing that happened, far into the future, after they looked at each other as if it was the only thing to do when you leave everything else behind, was Sylvia gesturing towards the window, looking at Michael.

Bright in the distance of stars they didn’t wholly know, a supernova lit up the black. 

She didn’t believe in signs, even now, but Michael took a breath. 

Whatever was out there, maybe they could still be the kind of people who found it.


End file.
